What I presume is the last book of the first arc in the series? Based on how it ends? Let's dive in, spoilers ahead.
Soren and the Chaw of Chaws are now traveling north to give Dewlap some inner peace. Here, they are confronted by all kinds of dangers, such as pirates, and meanwhile the Pure Ones are now planning to launch their final attack.
I'm sad to say that this one didn't hook me. At all. Which is sad because this is what I presume to be the penultimate book of arc one. Kludd was the main villain there, and now he's dead and Soren is hailed as a true hero. So this definitely seems like a conclusion of sorts.
There are two elements I did appreciate about this book, however. One: the fact that Dewlap barely gets any focus. Last book implied that that was going to be a huge reason of their journey, but honestly this plot point is solved pretty quickly as Dewlap is dumped with some nuns and the story continues without her. Good riddance, because I think she's an insufferable character who doesn't deserve the pity or compassion of our heroes after the treacherous shit she pulled.
The fact that she's basically being rewarded (being sent to the nuns to hopefully regain her inner peace) instead of being punished like she should be is just kind of sick to be honest. No, I don't think she should be left in this state forever, but let her wallow for a bit and confront the results of her betrayal before instantly shipping her off to live in peace with the Sisters. This basically sounds like "oh, the traitor who worked with the tyrannical racist owl clan is being instantly rewarded simply because she feels sad for what she did". Doesn't feel very competent from our heroes, or earned.
The second: the final conflict between Soren and Kludd was pretty cool, though ultimately it was Twilight who killed him. Which, I don't know, I think it would've been neat if Soren had been the one. Sometimes you have got to accept that even if some people are related to you, they're still just evil through and through and you may have to take heavy measures.
Especially since there's been this huge rivalry between these two brothers from the start. I get that Soren would initially want to spare Kludd, but I still think it should've been Soren to land the final blow, not Twilight. The conflict always felt really personal between them, so to now have this third party resolve it feels a bit anticlimactic. Like when in Warriors arc one, Tigerstar was killed by Scourge instead of Firestar, despite a rivalry between the two cats being built up for six books at that point. It feels a bit like a cop-out.
Still, I do think the final battle was pretty cool, despite these gripes. But the rest, I genuinely couldn't care less, whether it's the Dewlap subplot, the pirate subplot, learning how to use ice as weapons and whatnot. It felt largely boring and tedious to read, and honestly I don't know why because last book I found consistently engaging. I feel that my liking for Lasky's books varies quite a bit. There's some I genuinely really like (e.g. some of the Ga'Hoole books), but there's also some I genuinely don't care for or even dislike (e.g. one or two Ga'Hoole books I've read so far and pretty much all of Wolves of the Beyond).
Despite this I'm going to keep on reading them and I also plan to eventually tackle Lasky's other animal xenofiction series (e.g. Bears of the Ice), but for now my main focus is Ga'Hoole. The next arc in this series seems like it might follow Kludd's son Nyroc, so I guess that's cool?
Rating: 3/5
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